Time-Differential User Interface for Datacenter Management

1. A process comprising: gathering data for generating snapshots; capturing snapshots of a target datacenter, each snapshot representing a state of the target datacenter at a respective time, the target datacenter including datacenter components, each snapshot including values of respective parameters of respective datacenter components; comparing snapshots to identify changes in the values occurring between the respective times of the snapshots; and generating a datacenter representation of the target datacenter, the datacenter representation including, component representations of the datacenter components, and tags in visual association with respective component representations, each tag indicating a change that occurred between the snapshots being compared to a respective value of a respective parameter for the component represented by the component representation in visual association with the tag, wherein said tags appear the same on each of said respective component representations, said tags appearing with unique identifiers at each of said respective component representations, said tags further providing additional identification and explanation of what said tags represent when a user utilizes a user interface to interact with said tags, said datacenter representation including a three-level hierarchy topological representation including a representation of nodes and representations of corresponding node connections, said three-level hierarchy topological representation facilitating recognition by said user of relationships between said nodes, said tags rendered based on overlay data objects which are separate from said three-level hierarchy topological representation topological data object used to render the topological datacenter image, said overlay data objects providing data for rendering all image objects of a given type, said overlay data objects appearing at different hierarchical levels, said tags configured such that said tags represent data describing changes that occurred within a specific time range, said tags having unique identifiers at a first level, said tags not having unique identifiers at a second level, each of said overlay data objects includes a respective check box that, when checked, indicates that a corresponding one of said overlay data objects is active, said overlay data objects including a top-priority overlay which identifies said nodes with problems requiring immediate attention, wherein the identified differences are assigned to plural difference categories, the process further including changing which categories of identified differences are displayed based on user interactions with difference-category user-interface elements.

2. The process of claim 1 wherein the parameters belong to respective parameter classes, and each of the tags indicates a change that occurred to a respective value of a respective parameter belonging to a parameter class in a first set of parameter classes specified by a user.

3. The process of claim 2 wherein the parameters include configuration problem reports or service reports.

4. The process of claim 2 wherein the parameters include knowledge-base items relating to datacenters other than the target datacenter.

5. The process of claim 2 further comprising responding to interaction with a hierarchical-level control to change the hierarchical level of a representation of the datacenter.

6. The process of claim 2 further comprising responding to an interaction with a control to select which parameter classes are specified by the user.

7. The process of claim 2 further comprising interacting with a snapshot control for selecting which snapshots are to be used to generate the overlays.

8. A system comprising non-transitory media encoded with code that, when executed by hardware, causes the hardware to implement a process including: gathering data for generating snapshots; capturing snapshots of a target datacenter, each snapshot representing a state of the target datacenter at a respective time, the target datacenter including datacenter components, each snapshot including values of respective parameters of respective datacenter components; comparing snapshots to identify changes in the values occurring between times the respective times of the snapshots; and generating a datacenter representation of the target datacenter, the datacenter representation including, component representations of the datacenter components, and tags in Visual association with respective component representations, each tag indicating a change that occurred between the snapshots being compared to a respective value of a respective parameter for the component represented by the component representation in Visual association with the tag, wherein said tags appear the same on each of said respective component representations, said tags appearing with unique identifiers at each of said respective component representations, said datacenter representation including a topological representation including a representation of nodes and representations of corresponding node connections, said topological representation facilitating recognition by said user of relationships between said nodes, said tags further providing additional identification and explanation of what said tags represent when a user utilizes a user interface to interact with said tags, said tags rendered based on overlay data objects which are separate from said three-level hierarchy topological representation topological data object used to render the topological datacenter image, said overlay data objects providing data for rendering all image objects of a given type, said overlay data objects appearing at different hierarchical levels, said tags configured such that said tags represent data describing changes that occurred within a specific time range, said tags having unique identifiers at a first level, said tags not having unique identifiers at a second level, each of said overlay data objects includes a respective check box that, when checked, indicates that a corresponding one of said overlay data objects is active, said overlay data objects including a top-priority overlay which identifies said nodes with problems requiring immediate attention, wherein the identified differences are assigned to plural difference categories, the process further including changing which categories of identified differences are displayed based on user interactions with difference-category user-interface elements.

9. The system of claim 8 wherein the parameters belong to respective parameter classes, and each of the tags indicates a change that occurred to a respective value of a respective parameter belonging to a parameter class in a first set of parameter classes specified by a user.

10. The system of claim 9 wherein the parameters include configuration problem reports or service reports.

11. The system of claim 9 wherein the parameters include knowledge base items relating to datacenters other than the target datacenter.

12. The system of claim 9 wherein the process further includes responding to interaction with a hierarchical-level control to change the hierarchical level of a representation of the datacenter.

13. The system of claim 9 wherein the process further includes responding to an interaction with a control to select which parameter classes are specified by the user.

14. The system of claim 9 wherein the process further includes interacting with a snapshot control for selecting which snapshots are to be used to generate the overlays.

16. The system of claim 15 wherein the difference-category user-interface elements include a difference-category that, when activated, cause instances of a respective category of identified difference to be added to the display.

17. The system of claim 15 wherein the process further includes, in response to a hovering over an instance of a difference-category user interface element, displaying a textual description of the difference represented by the user-interface element.

18. The system of claim 15 wherein the process further includes, in response to an interaction with the display, changing at least one of the snapshots and associated times used to identify differences.

19. The system of claim 15 wherein the difference categories include: a fault/failure category having instances corresponding to failures or faults in a component of the computer system, a problem-report category having instances in which problems have been reported referring to a component of the computer system; a service-report category having instances in which a solution to a problem is reported referring to a component of the computer system; and a configuration-change category having instances in which the configuration of a component has been changed.

20. The system of claim 15 wherein the computer system is hierarchical and in which a user can navigate the user interface to display different levels of the hierarchy, such that, for at least one case, the tags reappear at different displayed levels.

21. The system of claim 20 wherein the tags change in form as the user changes hierarchical levels.